


a heap of broken images, and the dead tree gives no shelter

by strigastrigastriga (krasnyj)



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Artist Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Canon-Typical Violence, Howling Commandos - Freeform, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mental Institutions, Non-Linear Narrative, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, carnies and marks, das kabinett des doktor caligari, german expressionism, not a happily ever after, somnambulism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-10
Updated: 2016-04-10
Packaged: 2018-05-30 16:06:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6431164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/krasnyj/pseuds/strigastrigastriga
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>America, 1937. Steve Rogers works in a traveling carnival. There's a foreign doctor showing off a man he calls The Somnambulist, who sleeps until he's given commands. Everything is fine until it's not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a heap of broken images, and the dead tree gives no shelter

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Обломков груды под палящим солнцем, и мёртвое древо тени не даст нам](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11705256) by [fandom_EvanstanStarbucks_2017](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandom_EvanstanStarbucks_2017/pseuds/fandom_EvanstanStarbucks_2017), [softly_play](https://archiveofourown.org/users/softly_play/pseuds/softly_play)



> so there's this old german movie...  
> title from "the wasteland," by ts eliot.

April is the cruellest month, breeding  
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing  
Memory and desire

.

.

When the Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition (also known as the Chicago World’s Fair) ended, people wanted to hold onto the magic somehow. And thus, the traveling carnival. Steve Rogers was born long after that World’s Fair burned down and Chicago’s first – in fact, America’s first – known serial killer, H. H. Holmes, was executed. That’s old news, now. And Steve is a New Yorker.

It’s 1937, and Steve is working for one of an estimated 300 carnivals traveling the country.

Sometimes he sells tickets, or takes tickets, or counts money late at night; he hawks candies and snack cakes and hot fried food; his favorite thing is when he’s allowed to do caricatures. All he needs is a stool and something to draw on, he’s got his own watercolors and pencil stumps and nubs of charcoal and he’s good at it. Sometimes he even does it on his days off. He’s saving up; these are not kind times. But it’s more fun than most work, because he gets to draw all different kinds of people, to figure out what it is about them that makes them _them_ , at least visually – whether it’s bristling eyebrows or a stunning smile or striking eyes. He sketches sweethearts and families and fidgeting kids. It’s not a bad life. 

His mam is gone. His dad died when he was so young that he doesn’t even have any memories, just a distant absence. He’s small and his health’s bad, so some of the guys get on his case because he can’t help them pack things up, he can’t lift heavy trunks, he sneezes when they try to put powder on his face. He’s not made to be a clown, even though he’s outgoing and he’s good with kids – he just doesn’t have the energy for antics, he starts wheezing pretty quick. It’s funny at first, and then it’s sad.

But there’s a lot of good guys, too. There’s Timothy Aloysius Cadwallader Dugan (Dum Dum for short), a strongman with incredible marksmanship, and Robert “Rebel” Raston, a Kentucky boy who can ride and rope with the best of them, and Gabe Jones, who speaks several languages, just like Jacques – well, Jacques Dernier only speaks French and English, but he can breathe fire and he likes to blow things up. They’re all of them beefy and boisterous and they’re nice to Steve even though he’s not like them. Good guys. 

So maybe sometimes Dernier claps a chalk-covered hand on some mark’s shoulder, letting them all know he’s an easy target, or Dum Dum’s got his bottles set up so they can’t be knocked down, that’s just business. People come to the carnival for the different rules, to smell fried dough if they’re not eating it, and the lights and the women in sequins and fishnets, the men with face paint, and the carnies, barking at each other in their own secret language. People come to the carnival because they want to feel displaced. They want to go home at the end of the night. (Well, most of them. Steve came and then he stayed.)

Steve understands that so much of it is only show, that you can’t look too closely or some of it starts to seem cheap. But he’s a part of it and there’s still some things that he can’t explain, not matter how long and hard he looks. He’s thinking about, specifically, The Cabinet of Arnim Zola, and The Somnambulist, James. He is trying to peer deep into that dark depth. If he ever happens to be free when one of those shows is scheduled, Steve slips into the tent and sits in the back. Sometimes he has to stand off to the side, because there’s no seats left. Sometimes he works his away around to the front, to get a better look, because his eyesight’s not so good.

It seems like, as – technically – colleagues, it should be easy for him to speak with Zola and James, to have a normal lunch with them where they talk about things like bread lines and where the hell is Amelia Earhart. But Zola pretends to speak little English, aside from what he uses in his shows, and James sleeps.

So Steve’s stuck in the audience. The Cabinet – the show – it goes like this: Zola drums up enough attention so there’s not a single empty seat, and then he bounds up on stage, where he stands in front of an upright coffin and speaks about the mystery of dreams, the fount of information contained within, if we only knew what to look for. And then he asks, “What if dreams could show us the future? Don’t you want to know your future?” And he says, “Imagine, if you slept for years and years, if your dreams lasted for weeks. Imagine what you might see.”

At this point, the crowd might begin to shift in their seats. They were promised something romantic and dark and inexplicable, and Zola’s musings are too abstract, too _weird_. They might begin to think he’s mad, and they’re starting to wonder when they should leave.

Then he flings the cabinet open, and there’s a man inside. Murmurs ripple through the audience. The man’s dark hair is long and unkempt, and his face is painted with dark, dark circles under his eyes. Even with all that, James has a face like a matinée idol, and there’s the romance.

The makeup’s meant to make him look unreal. Steve’s seen James in his coffin so many times, he’s got all the details down – his dark eyelashes, the strong jaw, the tender mouth. Something about him is so familiar, it makes Steve’s heart ache. Sometimes people linger after the show, drifting to the front, to the stage, to see what they can see before Zola packs it in. Sometimes Steve is among them.

The crowd is hooked again. A couple of pretty paper fans appear, making lazy arcs, like all of a sudden it’s a little bit too hot in the tent. Zola is explaining that James is a “somnambulist,” a man who in sleep imitates the actions of the waking. There’s just enough jargon that it sounds like real science.

“After years of careful experimentation,” Dr. Zola says, a sly look on his smug little face, “I’ve found a way to communicate with The Somnambulist, to control his deepest, darkest dreams. He is… under my control.”

The crowd chatters.

“You have questions, yes?” Zola smiles, benignly, like a loving father or a gentle teacher. “Well now, it is the time for answers.”

He puts a hand on James’s wrist and draws him out from the coffin, stands up on his tiptoes to whisper in James’s ear. There’s a kind of casual intimacy that makes Steve’s skin crawl, although he couldn’t say why. He’s not a doctor or a scientist, and he’s never exchanged a single word with The Somnambulist, so he can’t say where this protective feeling comes from, but he thinks James would hate this.

In any case, Dr. Zola coaxes The Somnambulist’s eyes open, and then Steve’s got something else to think about. Sometimes James stares far into the distance, never focusing on anything in the tent; sometimes his eyes roll back, and with the whites of his eyes showing, he speaks calmly. He’s got a nice voice, and, to Steve’s surprise (the first time he heard it), a Brooklyn accent. No matter whether he’s delivering good news or tragic, though, his voice is always toneless. That is to say, totally neutral, detached, emotionless. It’s a bit off-putting. Steve decides to admire his commitment to his character.

He tells people that they will live for a long time, or that they will die peacefully, or that they are destined for a life of glory. Steve would like to ask a question, but there’s nothing he wants to know. He doesn’t want to know how young he’ll be when he dies or how much it’s going to hurt, and he knows that he’s never going to find a woman who’s willing to marry him – heck, at this rate, he’s probably never even going to share a malt.

So Steve doesn’t know if The Somnambulist’s predictions come true. He knows that the tent is always full.

.

.

.

Golden light spills into his room. He wakes up, unrestrained, and all he has to do is show up for breakfast on time, and then he’s free to do as he pleases, until he’s got to be back for lunch. No one can eat until they call roll. In the afternoon, sometimes he takes baths. “Hydrotherapy.” It is soothing, but it doesn’t make anything different. Every day that he wakes up might as well be the same day. Someone says something about – there’s a note in his file, a near-drowning, but he doesn’t mind water.

Everyone likes Steve, polite and amiable Steve Rogers; he never swears and he’s small, so they’re not afraid of him. He’s allowed to walk in the gardens without a nurse, and everyone thinks his paintings are very nice.

They do not like Bucky so much. After he sent an attendant to hospital, they kept him mostly restrained for a few weeks. He’s sturdier than Steve, not so frail; they’re afraid to zap Steve because they’re not sure if his system is strong enough, but Bucky can take it. When Steve gets angry – when he thinks it’s wrong, and he’s got to stand up for what’s right, he’s got to take care of Bucky – they explain to him so carefully, so patiently, why it’s for his own good. Sometimes things get mixed up in Steve’s mind, and he forgets exactly what’s what, but they’re always so patient, every time he gets upset.

Usually Bucky’s got to stay in his room. This means Steve doesn’t see Bucky in the sunlight so often. Steve doesn’t think Bucky’s a danger to anyone who’s not asking for trouble, but Steve doesn’t get much say in how things are run around here. So he’s used to Bucky at night, Bucky the shadow, Bucky the dark solid warmth lying beneath Steve. It used to be the other way, didn’t it?

Steve stole the key, not Bucky (and they all think Bucky’s the troublesome one). Steve’s room’s not even locked. The first time he went in, he knew he’d be safe ‘cause they had Bucky in the jacket, so he sat on the bed and he watched until Bucky’s eyes opened. Lucky Bucky, his room’s got a window. Even with bars over it, the sky’s full of stars and their soft light is enough for Steve to see Bucky’s features. Not clearly, because Steve doesn’t see anything clearly.

Bucky wakes up and he starts speaking German, so Steve chides him gently. “You’re an American, Buck. English, speak English.”

“Oh, Steve,” Bucky says, “I’m so sorry.”

Steve just lays a gentle hand against Bucky’s cheek. Bucky turns his face into it and Steve can feel the motion of Bucky’s soft mouth as he whispers, “I did this.”

“We don’t need that kind of talk,” Steve says. They’ve cut Bucky’s hair. He puts his fingers on Bucky’s scalp, feels the soft short bristles, massages the back of his neck a little bit. Maybe Steve can get them to let him do it next time, because whoever did it this time didn’t have very steady hands. He likes the feel of the stubble on Bucky’s chin.  

Bucky’s breath hitches.

Steve leans in and nuzzles Bucky’s neck, bites the skin along the line of his jaw. Not hard enough to leave a mark. He’s not allowed to do that.

His fingers dance down Bucky’s sides, over the thick coarse material of his jacket. He’s afraid to set Bucky free, because he’s got this idea that Bucky’s not here, not really, not unless he’s tied down. (Did they try to run away once? But there were dogs. For their own good.) It’s an idea that Steve has got a hold of, and he had to come in here to find out, and now he’s not so sure what he’s doing, except that he can remember when it was Bucky’s hands up his shirt and Bucky’s hot breath trailing down his stomach.

Right?

He can’t really get his hands up under the straitjacket, it’s on too tight (that’s the point).

“Is this okay?” Steve asks, pausing with his fingers almost touching the skin of Bucky’s hips. He’s lost weight; his bones jut almost like Steve’s. It’s upsetting.

“I’m so sorry,” Bucky says again.

Sometimes Steve gets vertigo. For a moment he feels like he can remember what there is to apologize for: it’s the feeling of hands around his throat. And then it's gone, and Steve crawls back up Bucky’s torso and looks him in the eye and tries to think of something to say.

“Everything will be okay,” Steve finally says, “As long as we’re together.”

He gets Bucky’s lower lip between his teeth and he sucks on it, pushes his tongue into Bucky’s mouth, swallows Bucky’s groan, and then he leans back with a lazy smile. Bucky watches him with dark eyes.

.

.

.

 

“You.” The arrogant voice, the heavy German accent. “Come over here, boy.” 

The audience is draining out of the tent. Steve’s standing in the front, off to the side, waiting patiently for his turn to leave. Steve bruises awful easy, and when the crowd gets too close, sometimes he has a hard time breathing.

“You work here, ja?” It’s Zola. Steve nods. “I must go away for urgent business. I can’t bring Sleeping Beauty here with me.”

“That sounds like a real pickle,” Steve says.

“Not at all,” Zola says, with a big warm smile, “Because we have you.”

So Steve’s in Zola’s quarters, after helping him push the cabinet on a table with wheels, and they’re looking into the coffin (somehow it’s not a cabinet any more, it’s a coffin, and it’s weird that James is still inside, not walking with them). Zola does his hypno-magic-science act, although it’s a lot less flashy than when he’s on stage, and once James is sitting up he gives a series of orders: in my absence, you will listen to Steve. When Steve commands you to eat, you will eat. When Steve commands you to use the W.C., you will use the W.C. When Steve commands you to sleep, you will sleep. As an aside, he tells Steve to make sure James does his daily exercises and ablutions.

It doesn’t sit well with Steve. You eat when you’re hungry and sleep when you’re tired, and unless you’ve got a teacher who won’t let you leave class, you piss on your own time.

Zola leaves, and Steve says, weakly, “Hi there.”

James looks at him. His hair is somewhat disheveled from lying in his coffin. Up close and open, his eyes are blue. James is silent.

“My name’s Steve. I guess we were already introduced, sort of. Um, but you can call me Steve, that’s what my friends call me. I guess that’s what you would have called me anyway. Huh. I mean, just don’t call me Steven.” He can feel blood rushing to his face. This is about as bad as trying to talk to girls.

He glances over at James and sees that the other boy is smiling slightly. Or _maybe_ he was, it’s gone so quick that Steve’s not sure if he really saw it or he’s just wishing it were so.

“Um, so, I guess I don’t know a thing about somnambulism,” Steve goes on. “But, I, well, if you don’t want to sleep, I ain’t here to tell you to sleep. Or any of that other stuff.”

The Somnambulist stares at him, face still painted, and the effect is a bit ghastly.

“Why don’t you wash your face off and we’ll go get some dinner,” Steve suggests.

What follows is maybe the happiest three days of Steve’s young life. Sure, James hardly speaks, but he’s got a strong personality, it shines through the silence. It's the way he moves, the way he doesn't have to speak to convey something with his eyes, or just the corner of his mouth, the way he makes Steve feel like Steven Grant Rogers matters to someone. Steve likes him, a lot. And he likes having someone to do things with, someone who makes daily tasks seem fun and new, like life is more interesting.

For their first dinner, they have popcorn and hotdogs. Steve talks about himself, about his family and how he’s saving up for art school and how sometimes he gets sick (because he thinks James should be warned). “What about your family?” Steve asks.

James shakes his head, once, slightly. His expression is completely neutral, except that his eyes slide away, like he's trying to remember something. Or trying not to remember.

So that’s why Steve thinks he’s an orphan, too.

They’re walking through the midway, that first night, and there’s a rush of people coming out from Rebel’s rodeo show, and Steve finds himself grabbing a hold of James’s hand until they’re out of the thick of it.

“Oh, sorry,” Steve says, catching sight of the shocked look on James’s face. “I just thought, since you’re so quiet, if I lost you in the crowd – and you sleep a lot, so you might not know your way around, you’d be really lost.” He doesn’t say that he gets nerves and sometimes getting nerves means an asthma attack.

James puts his hand on Steve’s shoulder and squeezes. With the stage makeup, he looks sinister. Without it, he’s still got dark circles under his eyes, but it just makes him seem human, and young, and maybe kind of fragile. But he’s got strong hands.

Steve wants to ask if James really sleeps so much, if he really sees the future, but the words get stuck in his mouth. He’s not sure if he has any right to know.

They stop by Dum Dum’s shooting game booth, and Dum Dum lets them play for free. Steve takes one wild shot and passes the gun off to James. James holds the gun with more care and authority than Steve expected, and when his first shot hits the bottles and they don’t fall, his eyes narrow. Dum Dum’s watching, mild interest visible in his expression. James’s second shot knocks over a pyramid.

“No prize,” Dum Dum says with a grin, “Coz you didn’t pay.”

They walk on, and Steve says to James, “Murder! Those games are rigged, you know. Where’d you learn to shoot like that?”

James looks at his hands, face impassive, and then back at Steve.

Steve doesn’t say, _that’s not an answer_. He just talks about something else. He talks all night, mostly trivial things, pointing out new vendors that must be local, because he’s been with the carnival long enough to know, about the last fireside chat he got to listen to, Franklin Delano Roosevelt on the radio, his ruminations on Joe DiMaggio – but he’s a Dodgers fan, Brooklyn born and raised. When he says that, he watches James, but there’s no sign that it means anything to James that they’re from the same place.

The next day, he’s up early and taking tickets. James sleeps through the morning, but Steve drops in at lunchtime and finds that James has woken. He’s just sitting up, back ramrod straight, staring at something a hundred miles away. Steve starts talking, just babbling, and James blinks and inhales and his eyes refocus on Steve and Steve feels something hot and tight in his belly. He’s got to do something, so he frets about what to do for James’s lunch, poking around a bit, but eventually James just pulls some bread and a can of beans out of the cupboards. He opens the can of beans and offers it to Steve, just like that, but Steve’s already eaten lunch, so he watches James eat cold beans from the can. He uses the bread to sop up the juice in the bottom, and then he puts the rest of the bread back.

Steve thinks about leaving him there, but it sounds lonely, so for the rest of the day, James sits with him at the entrance to the carnival. Steve decides that, after _that_ , they deserve some fun, so they leave the fairground. Dinner is bagels – plain for Steve, onion for James. Hot cocoa, afterwards, because there’s a bit of chill in the air, and then they go see a moving picture.

It’s the first time Steve has gone to a moving picture with a friend like this. James seems transfixed. Steve is carried away, too: it’s _The Adventures of Robin Hood_ , with Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland. It’s so exciting that, for almost two hours, Steve forgets about being Steve Rogers. And when it’s all over, James is still there.

“What did you think?” Steve asks. 

James smiles, and all of a sudden he doesn't look like he’s in his thirties and contemplating his stock portfolio; his face just _lights up_. Steve can’t look away. He’s going to commit this to memory and then he’s got to draw it. He suddenly understands why people are crazy about cameras, for the first time. He wants to preserve that smile, to hold on to it, to frame it and put it up on the wall, to be able always to look over and there it is.

Instead, they walk home in silence. Steve promises to stop by around lunch again. “I’ll be drawing,” he says, like he’s only just remembered and hasn’t been thinking about how to bring it up all the way from the cinema. “If you want, you can sit with me again tomorrow. I think it’ll be a lot more fun than taking tickets.”

James looks him in the eye and nods.

It’s even better than Steve anticipated, because James lets him do a portrait. There’s a lull in the afternoon, and when it’s beginning to get to Steve, James gets up from where he’s crouched on his haunches, by Steve’s side, and settles into the cushy chair Steve has set up for his subjects.

He automatically adopts an insouciant pose, slouchy. Steve finds that he’s not making a caricature, he’s just doing a portrait. He’s a bit nervous to begin with, so he begins with hesitant little lines, not sure whether to start with the eyes or the shape of the face. But it’s not long before he gets out of his head and just draws. When he shows James the result, he’s rewarded with another one of those lovely smiles.  

Then a big family shows up, and then Gabe brings his sweetheart over and Steve draws little hearts over their heads and he can tell that Gabe’s pleased with it, even though he pretends that it’s goofy and Steve's a sap. After that, he works until it gets dark. His stomach growls while he’s packing up his supplies. James disappears and comes back with ice cream cones. They eat together while they’re walking back to the trailer Steve shares with Morita, a quiet and serious man.

James waits outside, and Steve reemerges wearing a coat; he enjoyed the ice cream, but he’s starting to feel a bit of a shiver. He’s thinking that they could venture out into the city again to find something for dinner when someone walks too close to Steve, bumping into him roughly.

“Well wouldya look at that. Hey Joe, it’s this crumb. Saw you at the movies with your pal last night,” the someone says. “Someone” being a big man with thick eyebrows, and there are two guys behind him, arms crossed. There’s nothing friendly about the way this crew is looking at Steve. “Got another hot date with your boyfriend, Ethel?” He gives Steve another push.

Steve scowls. “You think you can say whatever you like because you’re bigger than me?”

“I _know_ I can,” the man says, with a cruel smile. He looks over at James and says, “Get a hair cut.”

Steve doesn’t think, he just starts to throw a big haymaker. The guy very gracefully moves aside and jabs a fist right into Steve’s gut, doubling him over. Steve’s gotta stay down for a minute, catching his breath. He hears some horrible meaty, crunching sounds, so he’s almost afraid to look up, but when he does, what he sees is: James, throwing all his weight into an elbow and breaking the guy’s nose. Blood gushes, and the man makes a whining noise; James kicks him in the side of the knee, and he goes down. Two swift kicks in the ribs (unnecessary). He’s on the ground, groaning.

One of the friends is lying on the ground, too, right arm bent at a wrong angle, and the third stands, paralyzed, until James kicks him in the stomach and then drives his knee up into the poor slob’s nose when he folds forward. Another crunch. Then, James drops an elbow onto the guy’s neck, and the guy crumples.

Steve starts to splutter, which turns into an actual coughing fit, and in an instant, James is back at his side, gentle fingers on his back, on his arm, helping him up.

“I was going to handle it,” Steve chokes out, “But that was swell. And kind of...” But he doesn't say _scary_ , even though it was, to see someone moving with such ruthless efficiency. This was definitely not James's first fight.

James ducks his head, looking at the ground. He looks shy, not scary.

“We’ve got to make tracks,” Steve says, and he finds himself holding James’s hand again as they book it.

Of course, Steve can’t flee for very long before he starts wheezing, so they end up taking a seat in front of a café, and while Steve is trying to catch his breath, James starts to talk.

“If you punch someone in the nose, the cartilage is like a cushion, so the force of your strike spreads out. It’s less explosive. I mean, a strike should be ballistic. Ideally. If you can sock someone in the jaw while they’re jabbering, you might dislocate or break their jaw. Or you could strike with the palm of your hand.” He points to the heel of his palm to illustrate, “At a slight angle. Also effective.”

Steve shakes his head. “Effective for you, I’m sure.” He tries to say it light, like he’s making a joke. Like the joke isn’t Steve.

“Yeah,” James says, idly tearing strips from a napkin left on the table.

“So, James. You can shoot better than Dum Dum, and that’s just the start of it,” Steve says, “Pretty impressive, for someone who sleeps all the time.” 

When James looks at Steve, now there’s something haunted in his eyes.

“Oh gosh, I was trying to make a joke,” Steve says. “I’m sorry, I just – think it’s nice when you smile.”

James blanches like Steve just licked his thumb and wiped at a smudge on James’s face.

“I keep saying the wrong thing,” Steve says with a sigh.

James starts to speak, and then he pauses. “My sister called me Bucky,” he finally says. “My middle name’s Buchanan. I like… Bucky.”

“Well, Bucky,” Steve says, sticking a hand out, “It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Something about “Bucky” feels right in a way that James didn’t quite. He doesn’t know what to think about that past tense, where Bucky’s sister is now, just like he can’t think about the butterflies in his stomach when Bucky’s hand grips his. Bucky Bucky Bucky, why does he feel like that means something more. He’s forgetting something.

They sit there for a while, and Steve talks a lot and occasionally Bucky says something. He thinks Steve is really good at art. He doesn’t seem like someone who’s seen the future. He smiles again, and then again.

Dr. Zola is waiting next to the empty coffin when they get back.

“Und wo waren sie? Was machten sie? Na, was hab’ ich gesagt? Bleib hier. Du bleibst immer bei mir.”

Bucky looks over his shoulder at Steve, an unreadable expression on his face.

“Sometimes big guys like to pick on me,” Steve says. “I asked… James… to walk with me, so I could get my dinner in peace.”

Dr. Zola frowns. “Selfish.”

Steve flushes an angry crimson, but he can’t say anything. There’s something about Dr. Zola, something – he’s creepy.

He wishes that Bucky’d started talking sooner, because now he’s got this horrible feeling, like there’s something really wrong here, and he’d give anything to know why Bucky’s here, with Zola. Wouldn’t it be simple – and better – to just stick with Steve?

He walks back to his trailer alone and finds the portrait of Bucky there. He’s so grateful that he has this, at least, to hold onto.

.

.

.

 

Steve spends the next day all by himself, all day, even though he’s surrounded by people. He thinks: it wouldn’t be so strange if I wanted to talk to him.

He goes back to the trailer and knocks on the door and Zola answers.

“The Somnambulist is sleeping,” he says. Steve can see just beyond him that Bucky is doing one-handed push-ups.

“Oh,” Steve says.

“Are the big guys picking on you?” Zola sneers. “Do you need James to walk with you to get your dinner? Ach, du lieber, you’re so small, if you miss dinner you might disappear.” He’s laughing at Steve.

Steve doesn’t want to be here. A part of him thinks – hopes – that Bucky’s going to defend him again, going to jump to his feet and smash Zola’s face. But Bucky’s just back there, switching arms. Doing one-handed push-ups on the other side.

That night Steve lies in his bed and thinks he could disappear and no one would notice.

Maybe he already has.

.

.

.

 

There’s a fire, a great conflagration. When the inferno dies down, Bucky doesn’t have a family any more.

When Dr. Zola finds him in the home, he’s been getting in fights for a while. He doesn’t fit in, he’s got a bad attitude, he doesn’t know how to process his grief; all he seems to be able to feel is anger. Maybe they just need to take out his skull and measure how much water it displaces. He doesn’t even cry in the shower, when no one’s around to see or hear. He just hurts, always, a persistent ache. It carves a hole in him, in the fundamental essence of James Buchanan Barnes.

He is perfect, the perfect subject for Zola’s experiments.

There’s just one person he can get along with: Steve, a smaller boy – though they’re the same age, or, in fact, Steve is older – a frail boy, with long eyelashes and a sweet mouth, like a woman. But he’s angular, he’s bony and sharp and the shape of his muscles, the way his throat bobs when he swallows: he’s not a woman. When the others want to pick on him, to shove him to the ground and laugh because he’ll still try to fight back, Bucky smites them like an angry god.

After, with raw knuckles and sometimes blood smeared on his face or his shirt, he’ll lead Steve to an empty room and Steve will cry, bitter hot tears, and Bucky’s awkward, consolatory. He doesn’t know how it feels, to be able to cry like that. He’d like to know. He makes soothing sounds and rubs Steve’s back, feels the knobs in Steve’s spine and the way that his ribs curve underneath his skin. There’s something about Steve that makes Bucky forget to breathe, sometimes. It’s _not anger_. He doesn’t understand it, not really, and sometimes he avoids Steve, because he already feels like enough of a stranger to himself. It feels kind of like he wants to hold Steve so tight that nothing can ever get close enough to hurt him again. It feels like this would be easier if Steve were a woman, all softness and golden curls - like then it wouldn't be wrong, what Bucky wants.

He can’t always be there, but when he is, he’ll always stand up for Steve. And when Steve’s sad and furious about being helpless, Bucky gets this weird fragile feeling in his chest. When Steve’s crying and the rims of his eyes are all red and his nose is pink, his eyes look extra blue, unnatural blue. Steve is ashamed. He thinks that he shouldn’t cry, that he should be more like Bucky.

There’s one time. It’s no different from any time until Steve looks up at Bucky with tears still drying on his face and he looks mad enough to spit, and he says, “Why am I like this?”

He’s leaning into Bucky, one hand curled in the coarse fabric of Bucky’s shirt. Can he feel Bucky’s heart beating? He looks up and –

They’re kissing. It’s hesitant and then it’s hungry, and somehow Steve’s lying on the floor with Bucky crouched over him, Steve’s hands tangled in his hair and he’s breathing hard, they both are, and Steve licks his lips and says, “We’re going to hell,” but he’s laughing, a little. Bucky’s got the taste of Steve in his mouth now and he feels like an animal that has to be put down because nothing but human blood will ever satisfy again.

“As long as we’re together,” Bucky says.

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It’s a few days before Steve can sneak back into the tent to see one of Bucky’s somnambulism shows. It’s funny, but when the coffin opens and he sees Bucky in the flesh again, his heart starts beating faster, like he’s seeing a celebrity or something. Zola goes through the same old shtick, and it really rubs Steve the wrong way now, because it makes Bucky seem like he’s not even human, like he’s a machine or an animal.

The questions people ask are fairly normal, until Howard Stark stands up. Even Steve recognizes Howard Stark, the brilliant inventor, genius businessman, and master of publicity. “How long am I going to live?” Howard asks.

Still looking far off into the distance, Bucky replies in his Brooklyn monotone: “Until tomorrow’s dawn.”

The crowd erupts. Howard Stark laughs it off and sits back down, and someone else asks something unspectacular, and Bucky answers, and so on. For Steve, though, it feels like someone’s poured ice down his spine. He wants to leave, but he has to wait for the crowd to go out first, and then he stumbles out, afraid that they saw him. He’s got an intense feeling of loss; he’s unprepared for the magnitude, and he can't understand where it's coming from.

He heads back to his station, afternoon break over. Working keeps his mind busy, although his sales suffer, since he’s not as enthusiastic in his pitches for Eskimo Pies and Oh, Henry! bars. It occurs to him that he may never speak with Bucky again, and he finds it unbearable. Which is silly, really, because a week ago, the status quo was not speaking to Bucky.

Steve’s got nothing else to do and he’s not ready to sleep, so he goes back to the cinema. He’s got to stop spending money like this – at this rate, he’s going to end the summer with less money than he started. But what’s worse than that is that when the movie ends, he’s alone. It’s a long walk back.

The next morning, Howard Stark is dead. He’s been murdered.

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Living in a cabinet isn’t much of a life.

Sometimes he wakes up when he’s already awake, and he doesn’t know what he’s doing and he’s scared. Sometimes he’s holding a piece like he knows what to do with it. He’s always somewhere that he’s never been before, somewhere new. Sometimes there are people looking at him like he’s a monster.

Waking up feels like his brain’s getting sucked back up through a tube that’s too small into his skull. He feels like he’s always asleep, so why is he always so tired?

Sometimes he wakes up and his voice falters, stutters to a halt: he’s in the middle of a recitation in German, which he doesn’t speak, so he can’t keep going. There’s a man wearing wire-frame spectacles and frowning at him, brows furrowed. “Was hab’ ich jetzt  falsch gemacht?” the little man mutters, peering at him owlishly.

“Where am I?” he asks, his mouth dry.

He wakes up with a long thin knife in his hand.

He wakes up looking down at his hands, palms up, like he’s trying to figure something out, and there’s a body in the corner of the room.

He wakes up as his leg extends into a warm body, knocking a man backwards into a wall. He automatically recoils into a fighting stance, weight on his front foot, and he moves to the man’s dead side, trying to assess the threat, but the man hits the wall and falls to the floor, _thump_ , and just lies there. He’s so tense, he’s just _there_ for five or ten minutes, poised, ready to stomp on the man’s face, his brain simply unable to say _it’s over_.

He wakes up and looks at the ceiling.

He wakes up.

He wakes up and he’s watching this scrawny blond eating ice cream. He can’t figure out what his face is doing for a minute, and then it comes to him that he’s smiling.

That night it’s the needles again and the dark.

He wakes up and everything is blue. He himself is little more than light and sound, vibrating harmoniously with the universe. He knows how to move like he’s one of the shadows, shifting and slinking along just outside of where the moonlight touches the ground.

He’s following a command. The Somnambulist doesn’t need a reason, a why. He was made simply to obey. He feels no remorse. He knows what he’s about to do and he doesn’t hesitate.

When he creeps into the trailer, he’s got no opinion about the mission. He will always complete his mission. It’s what defines him. To do differently is unthinkable.

Quick and dirty: he’s going to kill the target. It doesn’t bother him. He feels no doubt, except that he’s been standing here, in the corner, for almost fifteen minutes now, watching this boy sleep.

He’s going to complete his mission, but first he runs his fingers through the boy’s hair, brushing it away from his face, and whispers, “Do you remember me?” Or maybe he only mouths it, and there’s no sound. Does The Somnambulist have a voice? He’s not even meant to have a memory.

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Dr. Zola and Bucky aren’t allowed to do their show the next day. Steve knows because he tries to go, and the tent’s just empty. He asks around and hears from Dum Dum that the police are investigating the pair, questioning The Somnambulist. Why did Bucky say what he said? What’s his involvement? Probably that kind of thing. What Dum Dum wants to hear is how _Steve_ came to know The Somnambulist in the first place.

“What? Oh,” Steve says, because that feels like a long time ago. “Dr. Zola asked me to look after him while he was away.”

“Peculiar people,” Dum Dum comments. Then their conversation turns to how much longer the carnival’s staying here, where they’re off to next. Dum Dum’s looking forward to the jump, looking forward to a long weekend.

Steve finds himself sitting on the steps in front of Zola’s trailer that night. It gets late enough that he’s about to head back to his own bed when they finally get back.

Zola looks like he needs to take a shower, rumpled and a bit sweaty and clearly outraged. Seeing Steve doesn’t seem to improve his mood. Bucky’s stoic, handsome, withdrawn. He doesn’t make eye contact with Steve.

“I heard the police were questioning you,” Steve stammers. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

“Alles in Ordnung,” Zola says, and Steve doesn't know what it means but he sure understands the finality in Zola's voice.

Bucky is silent.

“Well, okay,” Steve says, and his voice is very small.

After he’s gone, Zola turns to Bucky and says, “Seine Zeit is abgelaufen.”

 _His time has run out_.

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Steve wakes up in his dark trailer, by himself, with someone’s hands around his throat. He squints, struggling to breathe, and his eyes attempt to adapt to the darkness. He’s clawing at the hands when his vision becomes clear enough for him to see Bucky’s face.

“Bucky,” he gasps out, and then everything gets dark again. What was even the point of waking up? That’s the last thing he thinks.

Bucky looks down at that still little body, the sheets that Steve disturbed with his struggle. If he keeps his hands as they are for a few moments longer, Steve will not have enough oxygen to survive.

Bucky loosens his grip. He holds his hands out in front of his face. They’re trembling. He’s trembling. He looks back down at Steve, who’s entirely still. No, there it is: chest rising, falling, inhale, exhale, exist, exist, exist. Bucky runs his trembling fingers through Steve’s hair.

Then he picks Steve up and carries him out of the trailer, away. Away from the carnival, down to the beach, carrying Steve like a bride all the way. It’s easy to carry Steve, he’s barely more than bones. He walks out to the end of the pier with Steve in his arms, and then there’s nowhere farther to go. He sets Steve down, gently, and lies down next to him, and watches him breathe.

That’s how the police find them. Morita was out, and when he came back, he saw someone slip into his trailer, and he knew Steve was in there sleeping, so he called the police. The police came and knocked on the door and burst inside and shone their flashlights on the empty bed, and then they ran back outside, and they followed the hue and cry, and then even though it’s the middle of the night, the pier is full of people and police and everything is noise and light, until there’s no borders left, no boundaries, no skin, Bucky’s just this infinite light.

When Steve wakes up, he plunges off the pier and into the ocean for no apparent reason. It takes them a long time to get him out. He coughs up water and he can’t stop shaking, can’t stop his teeth chattering. He won’t explain what happened.

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Steve likes to imagine that Bucky’s real and not a ghost. He remembers… a smile, with real nice teeth.

They say he’s had a Break, because of his Nerves, and sometimes he has Episodes. But now they're treating him, he's going to get better. He sleeps a lot, or sometimes it seems like he’s sleeping but maybe he’s awake. Or maybe it’s the other way around?

He sees Bucky, with the dark smudges beneath his eyes. He’s pale and thin and full of electricity. Steve thinks if they really electrocuted you, you could never walk or eat again, and your hair would stand up like a hedgehog. He’s allowed to hold scissors, so he can cut Bucky’s hair, since he’ll do it the best, and it’s fine and soft. So right now he doesn’t think Bucky is real, just one of his Episodes.

Everything he does with Bucky is a secret, because he knows he’s got to make them think he can tell the difference between the living and the dead.

From March to April, the magnolia trees scattered across the grounds bloom and block out large swathes of sky. Strangers leave flowers on the memorial.

Sometimes Steve talks to his ghost about his plans, about how he’s going to go to school. He’s going to be an artist. He’s practicing. He gets his sketchbook to show off all of his drawings, and he watches Buck flipping through the pages, tears streaming down his solemn face.

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**Author's Note:**

>  _Das Kabinett des Doktor Caligari_ is a German horror film (1920). I was thinking about how there are a lot of parallels between the story of Cesare the Somnambulist and The Winter Soldier (in terms of being kept in boxes by creepy German doctors, having missions and emotional complications etc) and then somehow I wrote this ugh I hope someone likes it. (I would love feedback, mes amis.) if you want to check out the movie, it's available online (watch the tinted version).
> 
> extended quote from _The Wasteland_ : "Son of man/You cannot say, or guess, for you know only/A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,/And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,/And the dry stone no sound of water."


End file.
